HIRING PEOPLE : NEW GRADS or CAREER SHIFTERS?

There have been so much hype and quibbles about the emerging new industry in the Philippines called Call Center Industry (CCI), most specifically Business Process Outsourcing (BPO). The Internet is calling it a phenomenal industry, newspapers banner it as the trend of the future, and even our government is giving heads to it as the economic savior.

So many statistics have been released by various grops of economic monitors. Some boggies the imagination, other contradictory. Is the CCI really the answer to the national economic slumps? What is its effect to the socioeconomic environment? Is it good or bad?

SURVEYS AND FORECASTS

Research by independent market analyst, Datamonitor, reveals that the number of call center agents based in the Asia-Pacific region will continue to grow throughout the next five years, driven by the low costs, ever increasing language skills, and internal demand. According to Datamonitor, “Asian markets including India, the Philippines, Malaysia, and Singapore will be driven by internal demand in additional to a focus on language capabilities and comparative advantages from price standpoint” Datamonitor also noted that “new locations such as Canada, Australia, and New Zealand would continue to adopt Asian outsourcing markets, in addition to mainstay clients, which include the UK and the US.”